(Yicai) Oct. 14 -- Apple’s Chief Executive Officer Tim Cook has said the new iPhone Air will go on sale in the Chinese mainland next week after the country's three largest telecom providers opened pre-registrations for eSIM services.

Apple will release the iPhone Air in the mainland on Oct. 22, Cook announced during a livestream on Douyin, the Chinese version of TikTok, late yesterday. This was his first livestream appearance on the platform since Apple opened its flagship store on Douyin Mall in August.

The California-based tech giant had delayed the launch of its thinnest iPhone in China last month because the country’s telecom carriers have not previously supported eSIM.

China Unicom has now opened a pre-registration channel for eSIM services, it announced early yesterday after receiving approval from the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology. China Mobile and China Telecom also said that users could go to their stores to subscribe to eSIM services.

The iPhone Air, Apple's first phone to support eSIMs and the only eSIM-enabled model in China, will be priced from CNY7,999 (USD1,120).

On the same day, Cook attended Pop Mart International Group's The Monsters 10th anniversary event in Shanghai. He was presented with a custom Labubu holding an iPhone from Kasing Lung, the Hong Kong designer who created the viral plush toy, and a Zimomo, the "Great Leader" of Labubu, from the toymaker's founder and CEO Wang Ning.

Wang and Kasing also showed Cook the original Labubu design sketches, while the artist drew one of the ugly-cute elves on an iPad Pro.

Apple has shipped 3 billion iPhones since launching the first model in 2007. China has always been an important market for the company, with its executives repeatedly reaffirming that the country remains a key supply chain base.

Editors: Tang Shihua, Martin Kadiev